You Hold Your Truths Coiled Around Your Heart
by Merida's Hair
Summary: Just before Emma tells Henry about Archie's death, she spots a familiar car parked across the street. Pre-Swan Queen. AU for "The Cricket Game."


A/N: Prompt from evilqueenapologist on tumblr: "In 'the cricket game' Emma notices Regina sitting in her car across from her and Henry, just before she is about to tell him that regina killed archie."

* * *

Someone once told Emma to trust her gut instinct. Maybe it was one of the less shittier foster parents, hell it might have even been a prison guard looking to give a lonely pregnant eighteen year old prisoner some life advice so she doesn't fuck up again. Whoever it was told her to trust her instincts even when facts are pointing otherwise. Because weirder things have happened, and she could be right after all. And before her lie detecter started going screwy, she was right most of the time. Of course whoever they were didn't exactly anticipate the kind of evidence Emma just witnessed through a magical dream catcher, but still those words stuck with her. Even as Regina threw her across the lawn, as scrapes marred her knees.

As Regina's cast down expression looked anything but guilty before she gave up the fight and _left_. Something that Regina Mills certainly had never done. Regina would fight tooth and nail, no matter the cause, no matter the price, no matter the impossibilities, and she'd left without another scathing glance or word. Defeated. And no matter what, Emma didn't like to associate that word with Regina. It was a too familiar feeling. Defeat. It bound them together, how life kept throwing different assortments of shit at them, and daisies at others. Saviors weren't supposed to sympathize with Evil Queens, and yet here they were.

Because yeah, Emma had seen Regina kill Archie. With her own eyes. And that should be enough evidence to lock anyone up. Even Emma had jumped to conclusions. Tried to take down Regina with that spark of betrayal and a bit too much righteousness than she'd ever had before.

And now?

Now she's sitting next to her kid, her hands shaking slightly, her legs not able to stay still, and her gut is still saying this was _wrong, wrong, wrong_ and she has no idea why. Henry is looking at her with that damn innocent expression, and she is about to crush it, and she _has_ to tell him because it's the responsible parental thing to do, (right?) but as she lingers on the feeling of _wrong_ and replays the scene with the dream catcher over and over, the words _Your Mom killed Dr. Hopper Henry, I'm so sorry_ refuse to leave her mouth.

She looks over across the street when her tongue-tied facial expressions are starting to make her son visibly suspicious. And peering _very_ closely sees a hint of black paint, and then a very familiar Mercedes parked as surreptitiously away from them as it could be.

_Regina came back._

She makes an apology to Henry and bounds over to the car, praying it won't zoom off as she grows closer, but it stays, and it takes a few moments of heart-wrenching silence to realize the sob formed on Regina's face, the way her hands grip the steering wheel like it's her last tie to this world. She feels her stomach plummet as Regina notices her presence and she attempts her usual mask, somewhere between indifferent and regal, but she can't hide the evidence of red-rimmed eyes, a red nose, and puffy cheeks. She rolls down her window.

"Are you going to_ arrest_ me, Sheriff?" She asks, her voice hoarse, but sharp as a knife.

Damn it all, she is going to trust her gut instinct for just one more moment. Considering murder was kind of the Evil Queen's mojo, crying in cars after being accused of one didn't seem right. It made Emma remember that this wasn't the Evil Queen, at least not anymore. That was a character in a storybook, written with every simplicity it simply didn't have. This was a woman named Regina Mills. She'd had horrible shit happen to her, did horrible shit, enacted vengeance that failed time and time after again, and is also trying to start over. She wants to be better for her son. And she's _capable_ of it. It's an amazing thing, and maybe Regina just needs someone to squeeze her hand tightly and believe in her, even if she doesn't exactly deserve it.

"Did you kill Archie?" Emma asks again with baited breath and more calmly than she is feeling. She leans close to the window, but not close enough that she would rest her arms on it.

Regina looks directly into Emma's eyes. Strong. Her eyes are wide and dark, but determined. Beckoning to be understood. To be believed. It's such a juxtaposition to how she was just hours ago. Or maybe it wasn't. Maybe Emma just didn't see it, or want to see it.

"No." She answers, her voice full of resolution and impossible truths.

"Okay." Emma breathes as a weight somehow is lifted off her shoulder blades, and Regina's brow lifts in confusion, like the last thing she expected was to _be_ believed. Emma needs more proof. Any kind of proof. Proof that she isn't going insane, proof that her gut instinct still worked, that Henry's mother hadn't given up.

She blurts a question out before she has time to process it.

"What does Pongo usually do when you came in for appointments?"

Regina's brow lifts again, and she finally lets go of the steering wheel, placing her hands on her lap. She manages to look intimidating, and Emma almost has to feel impressed.

"Is this an interrogation?"

"Just answer the damn question."

Regina sighs, more wearily than she probably intended. "He barks excitedly and comes up to me to be petted. I usually wave him away, but occasionally I oblige."

_And telling the truth._ Emma thinks carefully back to her vision. Pongo had seemed….upset more than excited. And he had visibly shirked back, like Regina had scared him. More _wrongness_ glared out, but Emma was having trouble connected the pieces of this fucking crazy puzzle.

"Where were _you_ last night, if not at Archie's office?"

Regina glances down for a moment, and her lips purse. She looks as if she's not going to answer for a moment, but then she glances back up again, her lips tight and her expression vaguely annoyed.

"I was working last night." _Lie._

"Alright then, how about the truth, Your Majesty?"

Regina blinks. "Oh right, your _self-created_ lie . I was on my couch while drinking a glass of wine. _Happy?"_ Her voice gets more and more biting as the red starts to vanish from her eyes, as the tears leave track marks on her face.

_No_, Emma wants to say. _Because this is so fucked up and I have no idea what to do._ Instead she says:

"I'm taking you back to the station, _not_ to be arrested, but to continue this conversation. And I need to get Henry home."

Regina's eyes immediately soften, as they tend to when Henry is brought up. She grabs Emma's arm through the window, her touch firm, but hesitant, and her skin warm. She looks up at Emma with hope in her eyes, and it's _too_ much, and Emma almost has to look away.

"You were going to tell him."

"I was."

"Why aren't you going to anymore?"

"I need to be sure."

Regina's eyes narrow.

"And you're not sure anymore?"

Emma uses the hand on her other arm to squeeze Regina's hand tightly. As tight as she can. To let her know that maybe, maybe she has someone on her side for once. If Emma can prove her gut instinct right, and things can go back to the way they were starting to be. Animosity most days, but a hope of something better for _all _of them. No more Evil Queens and Saviors, just two mothers raising a kid. It could be that someday. It _could._

Not if Regina killed Archie, the horrible truth was. And maybe, just _maybe_, she didn't after all. A delicate balance had been crushed. But perhaps it could be brought back.

She had to try.

"We'll figure it out, Regina. It just…didn't feel right. Like it wasn't you, even though it was. I didn't realize it till after the anger faded mostly…but…."

Regina gets out of her car then, slamming the door loudly, defiantly. Was everything she did loud and defiant, deep underneath it all?

Her jaw lifts with an air of superiority, like she still controls the situation. And still there is the slightest hint of the tears on her face, but Emma knows she would deny it at every chance she got.

"Well then, Sheriff. Take me to the Station, if you promise me that I'm not going to be jumped by your idiotic parents or their dwarf companions."

"You_ won't_." Emma says quickly and rolls her eyes in exasperation. But she realizes that yeah, getting Regina to be listened to and not treated horribly was going to be hard.

"I'll prove I didn't kill the Bug. I _will_. You can be assured of that." It is far more Madam Mayor, than the broken woman she'd happened upon in a Mercedes Benz, broken from years of everything going wrong when it could have gone right, but perhaps this was how Regina always dealt with breakdowns and loss. By getting up and fighting, even if the fight led to the destruction of others, and the destruction of herself. This was a different fight, however, this was a fight for the kind of future Regina wanted to have. For herself, for Henry. _For Emma._ Maybe.

And she really hopes, sincerely hopes, that Regina could prove to them all that Emma's gut instincts were right about this one.


End file.
